


Plant Your Hope with Good Seeds

by river_soul



Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Canonical Character Death, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-10
Updated: 2012-04-10
Packaged: 2017-11-03 10:26:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,258
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/380370
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/river_soul/pseuds/river_soul
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the end they trade her, with a chest of Lannister gold, for the Kingslayer. Spoilers for A Clash of Kings (AU beyond that).</p>
            </blockquote>





	Plant Your Hope with Good Seeds

**Author's Note:**

> These people do not belong to me. This is a response to the prompt "They do exchange her for Jaime, but the girl Robb gets back is different than the one he bid farewell to in Winterfell" from The GoT Exchange. Many thanks to my awesome beta's norgbelulah and jasmina22

In the end they trade her, with a chest of Lannister gold, for the Kingslayer.

\-- 

Sansa is careful to keep her face empty and blank when she hears the news, mindful of some dark, nefarious trick hidden within the Queen Regent's words.

"My brother is a traitor," she says flatly, words as familiar to her now as her own name, when Joffrey asks her if she's pleased. The court erupts into cheers, excited voices murmuring Jamie's name and Sansa’s proclamation falls on deaf ears. Beside her Cersei Lannister is smiling, the first honest expression of joy Sansa has seen. She is beautiful, blinding as the southern sun and Sansa looks away. She lifts her face upward to the northern window and the open slice of blue sky as she pushes down the rising tide of hope inside.

Hope is a dangerous thing in King’s Landing.

She cannot allow it to take root inside her and blind her again. She thinks of her father, beyond these walls, head rotting on a spike. Guilt rises sharply inside her and she feels the brief flare of hope, of longing for her family dwindle until there is nothing left and she is empty once again.

It is easier this way.

\--

The Hound walks beside her, one hand against the small of her back and the other holding firm to the reins of the horse weighed down with the chests that will buy the freedom of Jamie Lannister. They are in the Riverlands, the home of her mother but there is nothing familiar about this place to Sansa, nothing that warms her heart and calls her home.

"Little bird," the Hound warns and Sansa looks up, catching sight of two figures taking shape in the distance. One is the Kingslayer; dirty and beaten but the great mane of wild hair makes him look fierce like the lion of his sigil. One of her father's bannermen, nearly a head shorter, walks beside him. Sansa does not remember the man's name but she watches the tight line of his jaw jump at the sight of her. He speaks only to the Hound and Sansa watches Jamie Lannister stand stiffly before her, close enough touch.

He looks gaunt, as hollowed out as Sansa feels inside. He does not smile at her but the green of his eyes sweep over her carefully before he reaches out to capture a strand of her brilliant red hair between his fingers. Sansa's lips part soundlessly at the feel of his fingertips in her hair, the brush of his knuckles against the skin of her neck. For a moment the world narrows and the two men beside them and the armies at their backs disappear. Sansa does not understand the flicker of regret that passes over his features before he releases her hair and moves past her.

A cry goes up behind her and the large, warm hand at her back is replaced by a smaller one that urges her northward.

\--

They bring her to Robb's tent, away from the eyes of his men that watch her with a strange mix of hope and anger that Sansa does not understand. Robb crushes her against him and breathes her name into the softness of her hair as she stands stiffly against him. Sansa can feel the cold press of his armour against the thin silks of her dress and she cannot help the small, pained noise she makes when he brushes the tender skin of her back. He pulls away from her suddenly and for a moment Sansa is surprised to see the bright blue of her own eyes set in Robb's face, filled with the fear and worry she'd long since let go of.

"Sansa?" he asks gently.

She thinks, _it would be all right to cry now,_ when Robb touches the thin, neat line of red that splits her bottom lip in two and brushes gentle fingers over the swell of her cheek. The bruises on her face are older, yellow with age but she knows his eyes track the fresher ones, purple and blue against the pale skin of her neck and chest. He wants to touch her, to comfort her, that much she knows from the way his hand trembles, but he doesn't.

He is fearful and Sansa's soft sigh could almost be mistaken for the beginning of a sob but her eyes are dry. He looks away from her then, jaw tense and Sansa sees the rage and anger rise sharply inside him but she feels only gnawing emptiness inside where there should be sweet relief.

\--

"You are safe here," Robb tells her when they break their morning fast in his tent the next day. Sansa knows she should thank him. It would be easy to embrace him, to profess her love but all she might say _my brother is a traitor your grace_ spoils in her throat. So she says nothing when she sees the sadness that gathers on corners of his mouth when he frowns at her.

The sharp blue of his eyes follow her throughout the meal, as though he could make her speak through sheer force of will alone. Grey Wind sighs beside her, muzzle warm on her lap and fur rough against her hands. Sansa is reminded unexpectedly of Lady as the phantom feel of soft fur against her skin and gentle grey eyes spring to life inside her. For a moment her hand stills against Grey Wind and she reminds herself that Lady is long dead, if not by her hand, then her actions. Sansa is almost thankful for the pain that flares briefly inside her, the sharp feel of something, anything before it slips away.

She cannot seem to make it stay.

\--

She rides beside Robb, towards the head of the column as they make their way back to Riverrun.

Once she might have complained about the lack of sidesaddle for her to ride as a lady should but now she says nothing. She sits astride the horse like her brother does (like Arya used to). She says nothing about the rough-hewn shirt and pants he has given her to ride in or the way it rubs her skin raw. She accepts it as she does the ache in her thighs, the horse's wide, rolling gait painful beneath her.

Any delay could prove dangerous.

They ride hard, seeking word from their mother’s parlay with Renly. Robb’s expression is grim, focused on some distant point but Sansa can feel his eyes on her too as the sun tracks across the sky. He watches her carefully for an evidence of pain or discomfort and she knows he would stop the whole army for her if she asked, if she needed it.

Once that might have pleased her, made her feel warm and loved by his display but now it just feels dangerous, a liability she must carry. Sansa had not understood at first what it cost Robb to free her and return the Kingslayer. She understands now, despite his attempts to shield her from the talk in the camp, the obvious divide between those that see her as a symbol of the North they fight for, something of Ned Stark’s they can save and protect and those that look at her and see only her brother’s weakness.

She will not be his downfall too.

\--

Sansa sleeps fitfully, dreams an amalgam of horrors from her captivity. King’s Landing is leagues away but she feels the press of it at her back still, white hot and insistent. She cannot escape the Lannisters; even in her dreams she is forced to watch her own pain and humiliation again and again until it’s her father’s death she must relive. Everything plays out with a clarity she knows is not real but she’s helpless against it all. She hears her father’s false confession, written on her heart by now, and sees his face, the ugly surprise in his eyes when the Kingsguard force him to his knees.

 _No, stop, please oh please, stop_ she cries when he falls but in her dreams it is not by Sir Ilyn Payne’s sword that he dies but by her own hands, slick with his blood.

\--

Sansa wakes with a start, body tight with fear and skin sweaty. There is a rustle of movement behind her and for a moment she fears she has cried out in her sleep and woken Robb but it is only Grey Wind. His eyes are bright in the darkness. Sansa thinks it would be easy to call Robb to her now, like she did when she was a child with her father. He could sooth away the terror that knots her insides but instead she touches the crown of his direwolf’s head, heart in her throat.

He whines lowly and the bed creaks under the weight of him when he crawls in beside her, crowding her against the thin wall of the tent. He smells like Winterfell, the damp earth and musty decay of the Godswood and for the first time in what feels like years Sansa feels something shifting, loosening inside her chest.

\--

The raven comes before dawn, when the camp is still quiet with sleep. Sansa hears the men outside the tent as they speak with Robb in low, urgent tones. Grey Wind is awake beside her, chin resting on her hip as he watches the entrance of the tent where Robb is almost visible between the flaps. His profile is stiff and she knows when he comes back inside the news is not good.

"I cannot return you to Riverun myself Sansa," he says when he sees that she is awake. “Tywin Lannister is marching north and we must meet him. I will send you back with an escort. You will be safe.” His voice is heavy with the news he holds crumpled in his hand. His gaze lingers on Grey Wind for a moment, something unspoken passing between them. It reignites that dull ache inside when she thinks about Lady and how she will never have this.

"No." Sansa says, voice clearer than she expects. It is the first word she has spoken to her brother since he traded her for Jamie Lannister. "I want to stay. With you. Please Robb,” she begs, rising from the bed to stand alongside him. His surprise, the faint rise of hope in his eyes, warms something inside her. “I need to…stay. Please,” she asks, thankful for Grey Wind and the way he slides between them to fix Robb with soft brown eyes.

Her brother deflates a little then, mouth turned down sharply and she knows he’s going to agree with her before he sighs, long and deep.

“Very well.”

\--

Sansa watches Robb dress for battle, the tent behind him colouring pale orange and pink with the rising sun. In the bright light of dawn he looks like the heroes from her songs, brave and strong. For a moment she is overcome with all she wants to say to him.

_Be safe. Don’t go. Please don't die._

Instead she says, “Good luck, Your Grace.”

She means it to be light and teasing, like when they were younger and she’d call him Lord Robb of Winterfell but the words sound hollow and flat instead. His eyes are bright with the fear she feels settle inside her. It’s an unfamiliar sensation, this tenseness in her limbs that she cannot shake.

“It will be alright” he promises, pressing her close to him. His lips are soft against her brow and she feels small in his arms, protected and safe. She wants to keep him here with her but he is a man now, with a duty he must fulfill.

She has to trust that he will come back to her.

\--

It’s quiet in the camp after Robb marches out to meet the Lannister forces. In the distance, Sansa hears the sounds of the battle, the clash of metal and shouts of men. Sansa wanders the camp, unsure and restless. Most of the men are gone but those that remain bow when they see her, the title princess an unfamiliar word on their lips.

It’s nearly noon when Sansa finds the makeshift tent of the Maesters where most of the others are but she is unprepared for what she finds inside.

The smell of blood and death settle in her throat and she stands frozen in the entrance.

Some of the men are screaming, withering in agony and others stare unblinkingly ahead, already dead. Battle and the reality of war are overwhelming up-close and all Sansa can think is _none of the songs spoke of this_. There was nothing in her father’s stories about how men would beg for their life, for the faces of their families when they died. There is nothing beautiful or brave about dying like this, far from your home or those that loved you Sansa thinks.

_There is no glory here._

"My Lady," someone says from beside her, "You should not be here."

Gentle hands lead her out of the darkness of the tent and into the bright sun of the day where the air is clean and pure. Sansa can hear the sounds of the battle raging in the valley below and thinks of her brother, fighting for his life and their home. She thinks of the men in the tent and her father at King’s Landing.

There is a tightness in her chest, an awful weight pressing against her throat. Sansa is dimly aware of one of the Maesters speaking to her, urging her back to Robb's tent but the buzzing in her head swells and it is all she can do to keep her mornings breakfast from coming up.

Later, in the safety of Robb's tent, she cries, deep wracking sobs that steal the breath from her and leave her throat raw. She hates herself, something bone deep, for this weakness and frailty.

 _I am no Stark,_ she thinks.

\--

Sansa dreams of Arya, sword bloody in her hands and teeth barred. She is fierce and beautiful in battle, stronger than Sansa will ever be.

In her dream, Arya kills Joffery and every golden haired Lannister Sansa has ever set eyes on. Her sister lays each of their heads at her feet like a gift. Instead of the disgust Sansa expects, she feels peaceful, loved in a way she'd lost the day Joffrey had taken her father’s head.

She feels calm when she reaches for Arya's hand, the feel of her sister’s smaller, warmer hand a comfort. "You must be strong," Arya says but it's her father’s voice that Sansa hears. "You must be brave," he tells her and when Sansa rises from the bed, the hem of her white gown stained black with blood, she does not flinch.

It is warm and slick between her fingers but the fear has gone out of her.

"It is only blood," Sansa says, and beside her Arya smiles.

\--

It's quieter when Sansa returns to the Maesters tent, the sky almost purple in the evening sun but the smell of blood and rot is still overwhelming.

"Lady Sansa," one of the Maesters says, eyes wide with alarm when he sees her. "Please let me walk you back to your tent."

"No.” The steel in her voice is as sharp as any sword her brother might wield. "I wish to be of help,” she tells him.

For a moment the Maester says nothing, doubt and worry written across his old face.

"Let the girl help," says another voice, tired and angry, from somewhere deeper inside the tent. Sansa cannot see his face.

The Maester's lips purse in disapproval, for her request or the voice that addressed her too informally, Sansa does not know. "It might be a comfort for you to sit with those who are dying," he suggests carefully, ready for Sansa to decline.

"It would be my privilege," Sansa says, letting the surprise she sees in his eyes bolster her resolve. She does not flinch as he leads her through the tent, the dying and dead all around. She has almost convinced herself she is strong enough for this until she sits down beside a man, a boy really, whose skin has gone yellow and waxy. Her throat feels tight. She closes her eyes and thinks of Arya from her dream, brave and strong. When she opens them again the boy is watching her.

"What is your name?"

"Gaylan, your grace," he tells her, voice thin and high with pain.

"What...is there anything I may do to ease your pain?"

She feels suddenly foolish. Who is she to think she might offer words to comfort a dying boy?

"A song," he breathes out, spit thick with blood. Her stomach rolls and she thinks _it is only blood_ and breathes out unsteadily. Sansa knows no songs to comfort a dying man. What use does he have for stories of brave knights and lady loves?

“Of course,” Sansa tells him, thankful when she remembers the old battle hymn Nan taught her when Bran was born. She takes Gaylan’s hand in hers, his skin cool and clammy, and begins to sing. The words are simple, from a time before the Wall or Winterfell stood.

She sings of the brave men of the North, the children of the first men. She sings of the first great weirwood, a heart tree with kind eyes and a gentle mouth. She sings of the eternal summer and the beauty of the sun. When the last note eases out of her, Sansa realizes the hand in hers is limp and the boy’s eyes are glassy and empty.

Sansa knows the others are watching her, the tent is almost soundless now but their expectations grate loudly against her. She knows she mustn’t cry. She must be brave and beautiful like her Lady Mother, she must be strong and fierce like Arya. Her face feels hot with the press of tears but she breathes long and deep until the tightness in her chest dissolves. When she rises from her seat, she closes the dead eyes of the boy and wipes the tears from his cheeks.

She presses her lips to his brow and thinks, _it will get easier after this._

\--

The battle drags on and soon days begin to bleed into one another. Sansa’s moments alone with Robb are brief, tense things. They don't talk but he holds her tight, reminding himself that she is real and here. He smells of blood and dirt and Sansa expects she does too these days.

She spends most of her time in the Maester’s tent, helping where she can. Sometimes she sings to the men, other times she asks about their family and their homes in the North. Sometimes she says nothing at all but draws her hands along their brows and cheeks as her mother did when they were children.

Sansa thinks her father would be proud if he were alive to see her. She does not lead an army or fight in battles like Robb nor does she guard the realm at the Wall like Jon but there is honor in this, she thinks, to help ease these men into the hands of the Stranger.

\--

At dawn, on the fourth day, Robb’s men push the Lannister forces back. The men celebrate but Robb’s face is still dark with worry as night falls. Sansa does not ask what troubles him. He will tell her later, perhaps when they are alone in their tent or the next morning when they ride for the Crag. For now she tries to relax, to steal away a moment of peace in the happiness around her.

Someone finds a fiddle, badly tuned but the melody is familiar enough and the men beat their feet on the ground in a steady rhythm. It reminds Sansa of the festivals at Winterfell, the bonfire warm on her face and harvest moon bright in the sky. All around her the men cheer and clap and someone calls for her to sing.

She does, chest swelling with a pride she’d forgotten, as she sings a new song of the Wolf King, brave and strong. She is breathless by the time she finishes but it’s the expression on Robb’s face that stills the air in her lungs. Surprise lightens his features of worry and she thinks he looks young again, like she remembers from Winterfell when they were a family still.

He smiles at her, soft and so full of love, that Sansa cannot fight against the hope she feels unfurling inside her chest again.

\--

The Crag is not what Sansa expects, withered and ruined, but she knows it’s important for now.

“I’ll come for you once it’s safe,” Robb tells her before he leaves but when night blooms it’s three of his bannermen that come for her instead. _The King has been injured_ they tell her, _he asks for you._

When she sees him, laid out on the bed, fear coils hotly in her belly. He looks pale and sick in the flickering torchlight, a dark gash along his side and a broken arrow in his shoulder. The Maesters huddle over him talking over one another as they work. Sansa sees Robb grit his teeth when they pull the arrow out but he doesn’t make a sound. Blood wells in the wound, running down his bare chest in thick rivets.

Sansa goes to his side then but she does not comfort him like she does with the dying. He is her brother, but he is the King too and his men ring the room. She wants to take his hand in hers. Instead she holds his gaze, speaks to him with the draw of her brow and the tight line of her mouth.

_I’m here._

He grunts, the thick cord of muscles in his neck taunt when they dig into the wound but his eyes never leave hers.

\--

The fever comes later that night and he thrashes in his bed, brow damp with sweat. He calls out their names in delirium Arya, Jon, Sansa, mother, Bran, Rickon, voice desperate with grief.

He does not call out for their father.

\--

Robb is slow to recover; pale and drawn when he should be strong and fierce. The Maesters no longer attend to him; Robb has sent them away to help his men that have real need of them. Sansa and Lord Westerling’s daughter are the one that change his bandages and stitch his wounds together now. He chafes a little under their care. Sansa knows he feels caged in, tethered to his bed and relegated to pouring over maps and battle plans when all he wants is a sword in his hands and the rush of wind on his face.

Sansa understands this a little. It’s difficult to adjust to life inside the crumbling stone walls of the Crag.

Here, Sansa must become a Lady once again. She is not allowed to attend to the men in the Maesters’ tent. Instead, her time is full of needle work with Lady Westerling and her daughter, whose chambers Sansa shares.

The first few nights are the hardest, she wakes expecting to hear the gentle, rhythmic snores of Grey Wind or the funny words her brother speaks in his sleep. Other times she half expects the small, warm body beside her to be Arya. It is always Jeyne though, this stranger who sleeps beside her like a corpse, quiet and unmoving.

On the nights when Sansa wakes, terrified that she is back in King’s Landing again, she is thankful for that steady, quiet presence at her side. They never speak in the night but when Sansa wakes with a cry on her lips Jeyne’s hands are warm on her shoulders, her name soft on the other girl’s lips.

\--

It is late in the evening, Grey Wind a warm weight across her feet as Sansa sews together her fraying woolen dresses. The blood stains cannot be helped but Lady Westerling’s sharp eyes had seen the dark brown splotches on her sleeves during their first few days here. Now she wears borrowed dresses, ones she will give back when they march out again soon.

“Seven Hells,” Robb swears, and Sansa jumps at the sound as one of Grey Wind’s ears perk up. His eyes track her across the room as she comes to Robb’s side, shirt wet with blood.

“I suppose you better send for Jeyne,” he says, lips pressed into a thin line. “I’ve pulled my stitches again.” He sounds annoyed, but Sansa has seen the way he watches Jeyne over the past few weeks with growing interest. She smiles then and thinks her brother could do far worse than the beautiful and kind daughter of their unwilling hosts. Far better than a Frey, she thinks.

“I could do it,” Sansa offers, “Lady Jeyne has been teaching me. She says I’ve become quite good.”

Robb watches her unconvinced, a half smile tugging at the corner of his mouth. “I’ve only just recovered,” he teases her, “it’d be a shame to die from poor needle work.” He laughs then but the arrow wound in his chest cuts it short.

“Robb,” she tries again, and this time she schools her face into the hard, almost exasperated look her mother use to give him when they were younger.

“Alright,” he says, eyeing the needle and thread in her hand and the numbing poultice on the table.

When she is finished he looks at the thin, neat line of skin she’s sewn together. “I didn’t know you could do that,” Robb says, genuine surprise in his voice.

Sansa feels a bolt of happiness slide through her. “It would seem skin isn’t very different from cloth.”

“Lady Jeyne taught you well,” he says and lets her help him into a fresh shirt. “Who would have thought, the grand Lady Sansa Stark, stewing skin now…Arya will never believe this,” he says with a laugh before his expression turns serious at the look of pain that crosses her face.

“We’ll find her, I promise.”

“I know,” Sansa says. She wonders then if the day will come when it wouldn’t hurt to remember.

\--

They are sharing dinner, Robb laughing, loud and throaty, at Sansa’s retelling of the mishap from her morning in the kitchen when the sharp knock at the door interrupts them.

“Come in,” Robb bids and Sansa is surprised to see one of Robb’s bannermen, a note crumpled in his large hand, instead of the kitchen staff.

“My King, I apologize for the interruption,” he says, breathless and red face as he bows before them.

“A raven from Winterfell has come,” he says and Sansa watches the tight line of his mouth waver. “My King…Theon Greyjoy has taken Winterfell with the Iron men.”

Beside her Sansa can feel Robb stiffen in surprise, disbelief written across his face before it darkens with anger. It takes him a moment to recover and speak again. Sansa squeezes his hand in reassurance.

“What of my brothers?” Robb asks.

Sansa wonders what Theon wants for them, what Robb can trade for them. Bran is his heir now and Rickon is so small. They must get them back.

“Your brothers,” he starts and there is something terrible in his eyes, something that makes Sansa’s whole body go cold with dread. “Your Grace, Lady Sansa …I am sorry, he…he has executed them.”

For a moment the air stills around them. _No_ Sansa thinks, _no no no no_ and beside her Robb makes a strangled, wounded sound. Sansa feels an answering pain blossom in her chest.

“You may go,” She says then, voice calm and clear but inside she is screaming, raging.

“Robb, we must send for mother. We must-“ she starts, surprised by the wildness she sees in his eyes. His hands are painful on her shoulders, his grip crushing but she does not push him away. She holds him close and strokes the stiff line of his back until his breathing eases enough and he lets go of the sob that's bound in his chest. She holds him against her as he cries but her face is dry. She is a Stark of Winterfell and she thinks, I must be strong.

“I will kill him, I will _crush_ the Iron Isles,” he tells her, voice thick with emotion. The rage and fury with which he speaks with should frighten her were it not for the way she feels it settle inside too.

Somewhere in the forest below, Grey Wind howls, a terrible, broken sound that makes Robb shudder and Sansa tremble. She feels something shift inside, the last sliver of joy and hope that’d grown into the spaces of her heart since Robb rescued her slipping away as something dark and terrible settles in its place.

\--

Sansa does not go to her chambers. She stays with Robb and they curl around each other in his bed like when they were children, before the others were born. Robb breathes slow and even but Sansa knows he is awake. He stares at her, unseeing and the blue of his eyes seem to shine in the darkness. She traces at the gentle slope of his nose and the curve of his lips, so like her own. It’s easy, with the shadows falling softly across his face to see how he could almost be her twin. She thinks of the Lannisters then, surprised to find that fear and hate that had long since accompanied any thought of them feels dull and distant now.

“I can’t believe,” Robb starts, voice choked with emotion and Sansa’s breath hitches.

“I know,” she tells him when he meets her gaze, something too painful to be spoken passing between them.

She lets him tuck her head under his chin and hold tightly to her. She remembers suddenly, all those months ago when he held her like this after he’d traded the Kingslayer for her. She’d been brittle in his arm, unable to give him anything, as empty as she was inside, but now she feels so full of sadness and anger that it threatens to spill out of her and drown them both in its wake.

“It’s alright to cry,” he tells her, hands stroking the hard line of her back gently until she softens against him. When she looks up and into his eyes the love and understanding she sees awakens an old guilt inside her. It twists her insides, poisons any grief she might share with him.

_This is my doing._

\--

Their mother arrives the following week and Sansa feels guilty for the relief that fills her in knowing she will not have to tell her mother of Rickon and Bran. A raven did that for her.

It would have been kinder for her mother to hear the news from a familiar face but Sansa isn’t sure she can bear to speak those words aloud, _they are dead._ Sansa carries them inside her with the litany of others; _my father is dead, Lady is dead, Jory is dead and Arya is probably dead too._ There are some days her list feels endless. They are my fault she thinks, heart throbbing painfully in her chest as she waits for her mother and Robb’s men to make their way towards the Crag.

This is not the reunion she wanted but it is the one she is given.

They clasps hands and her mother’s skin feels paper thin against hers, the thin blue line of her veins visible under skin. Her lady mother has never been anything but beautiful and poised but Sansa can see up close where the grief has settled into the grooves of her face. _Sorrow has aged her, she thinks._

“Mother.” Her voice cracks just a little then, her only sign of weakness. She wants to bury herself in her mother’s arms, to drown in her tears and sorrows but she is no longer a little girl and the others are watching.

She must be strong.

“Robb?” her mother asks.

“He is out riding,” Sansa says. “He’s gone out every day since.” _Every day since he cried in my arms_ she thinks, _he rides with Grey Wind in the hills to forget, to grieve_. She sees it in his face, this ocean of sorrow that he lives in now and she is helpless against it.

Grief has made him a stranger to her.

\--

It is not until they are finally alone that they speak freely.

“Sansa,” her mother says and there is so much in that one word, _love, pain, joy, relief, fear and grief_ that it’s Sansa’s undoing. She sobs, an ugly sound that escapes from between her clenched teeth and runs to her mother. There is relief in the feel of her arms around her and her voice that whispers _I’m here, I’m here._

Sansa had felt safe with Robb, protected and cared for in a way that made her ache but her mother is something wholly different. It eases something deep inside her, soothes that jagged chasm she feels in her chest each time she breathes. Everything about her mother promises that things will be right again but the lie is bitter in Sansa’s mouth. Her mother, for all that she might do, is powerless against the truth. _Rickon and Bran are dead. Father is dead. Arya is lost to them._

“I’m sorry,” she sobs, suddenly desperate for her mother to understand. “I’m sorry for father, for everything,” she says, the words pressing, hard and unforgiving against her throat. “If father hadn’t died, Bran and Rickon would be alive and oh, Arya,” she cries.

Her mother’s bewilderment only makes her sob harder, fingers bone white as they twists her skirts in her hands. “I convinced him to admit to treason, the Queen said it would save him.”

“Oh, Sansa,” her mother says and the pain in her voice is almost too much. “No, sweetling, no. Your father’s choices were his own. He died because of Joffrey’s cruelty. It was the Lannisters that took his head. Not you. Never you. You must believe this.”

“No,” Sansa says. _It was me, it was all me,_ she wants to tell her mother but she is crying too hard and her whole body shakes with shame and grief. She deserves no pity, no love and for one wild moment, when her mother stiffens beside her, Sansa is sure her mother finally understands this.

“Sansa Stark you listen to me,” her mother says, voice sharp enough to stop the deep, wracking sobs that rattle her chest. She draws Sansa’s gaze to her own, fingers painful on her chin and eyes bright. _Tully blue_ Sansa thinks _like mine and Robb’s_. “”Your father is dead because of the Lannisters. They took his head and it was not your fault. I want you to say it. Tell me. _Tell me_.”

“The Lannisters killed father and it was not my fault,” she cries.

“Say it again,” her mother demands and Sansa repeats her mother’s words over and over again until the last sob escapes from her chest and she can breathe once more. She says them until her throat has gone raw, until they are the only words she can remember.

She says the words until she believes them.

\--

Later that night they sit together in Robb’s room, broken and splintered but a family once more.

The Crag is not Winterfell but in the stone rooms with the dim, flickering light of the fire Sansa can almost imagine they are home. She can indulge in the fantasy that her father and brothers are alive, somewhere in the castle and that when she throws open the windows to the training yard below see will see Arya and Jon Snow, fighting with wooden swords.

It is childish and foolish but it eases that pain that sings in her chest.

“I will avenge our family,” Robb promises them, eyes bright and earnest.

“We will avenge our family,” her mother corrects gently as she clasps each of their hands in her own. “We will avenge your father and brothers and we will find Arya.”

“For our family,” they say together and Sansa hopes for time when she won’t have these names _father, Bran, Rickon, Lady and Arya,_ written across her heart anymore. One day, she thinks, after all those who have wronged her family are dead and cold, her heart will settle in her chest, gentle and kind once more.

\--

In the morning they ride for the Twins and a wedding that will buy Robb the strength he needs to bring the Lannisters and Greyjoys to their knees.

Sansa sits tall and proud in her saddle between Robb and her mother, comforted by the strength and love they surround her with. _The Lannisters killed father and it was not my fault,_ she reminds herself, finding solace in her mother’s words and Robb’s warm hand in hers. Each of these things help to whittle away the guilt and sorrow she’s let become a part of her since Joffrey took her father’s head.

Together they help her understand what she could not in King’s Landing- there is hope inside her still. It is a song she has forgotten, one that Robb and her mother will sing to her again until she can find the strength that will lead her home, to Winterfell and her family once more.

**Author's Note:**

> New [tumblr](http://river-soul.tumblr.com/) friends are always welcome!


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